Follow by Email

Monday, October 27, 2014

Wednesday I’m going to the temple!!! Since I’m in the interior I will be going to
the Campinas temple!

Elder Farias and I have amazing lessons with our
investigators but we haven’t gotten any to church. I am by far having more spiritual experiences with
Elder Farias then with any other companion I have had. We are spiritually in
sync.We are always having the same
thoughts and during lessons say exactly what the other wanted to say.

My week was pretty good.The bugs are getting better.

Finding a house has still been a no go. In this area everyone requires two people to
sign a contract so that if one doesn’t pay the other will.But the church doesn’t work that way. We have found a ton of perfect houses but
because of the two signatures rule we cant rent them.A member is taking us house shopping later
this afternoon.

I’m ready to find a new house.There is one elder I live with that is just
driving me insane. I just have to walk
away at times so I don’t get angry.

I have bad luck with beds here. My bed broke for the second time in the
mission. I think ALL the beds in Brazil
are twin sized. My feet hang off the
edge on all of them.

Elder Farias and I are doing a ton of service for the members
and investigators this week.I like
giving service.One plus to serving is I
don’t have to walk around in church clothes.

Monday, October 20, 2014

It has been hard. I feel like my mission trials are really starting. Trying to battle the bugs and the weather is getting to me. I had thoughts about coming home this past week but my week ended good and the weather cooled a little. I am pushing forward.

I get eaten alive here. I wake up just about every night because there are so many mosquitos around. I end up breathing them in during my sleep.

I slept at another missionary’s house last preparation day. They have a hammock outside. It was crazy hot so I went to sleep in the hammock. It was way comfortable and there was a little breeze but I was getting eaten alive by the mosquitos. I went back to the mattress in the middle of the night. Later, I felt something on my arm and I thought it was a mosquito. When I swatted it, it was something huge. I got up and opened my blanket and I had cockroaches all over me! I didn’t sleep the rest of the night. It really bothered me.

My legs and arms look just like chicken pox. In our house we play a game where we see who can kill the most mosquitos at night. Last night I killed twelve.

We have one fan in our house and because my bed is in the middle of the room I am lucky. I have the fan blowing on me all night but mosquitos still bite me.

I haven’t seen bug spray at all. Someone told us that you can buy a thing to stick on the wall to keep the bugs out but I haven’t seen it anywhere. I asked around about where to buy mosquito nets but no one knows of a store here.

In turns out my companion didn’t have dengue fever. He is just fine now.

We received a lot of references from the members this week, which has been a blessing. We see progress with our investigator’s testimonies but getting them to church is still a battle.

Monday, October 13, 2014

The missionary work here is starting to happen! We have
eight new investigators this week and one of the people who previously dropped
us returned so we have several people to teach!There is much work to do in this branch.

My companion has been sick for the past four days. We think
he has dengue fever.The other night we went
to the hospital at 2:00 in the morning. He
is in some pain but it’s not as serious as it sounds. Sister Andrews, the mission president’s wife,
told him to stay in after 5:00.We
still go out and work because he refuses to sit around.He just wants to work.

IT’S FREAKING HOT HERE. I’m dying.I literally am sweating 24/7.The
inside of our house is like 88 degrees and the outside is 95.There is absolutely no breeze or anything. We have a fan in our house but it
does nothing.The air in our house is so
hot.The fan just blows hot air over
you.I don’t know what I’m going to do
about this heat.I don’t think I’m
getting use to it.I feel like I’m
breathing with a blanket over my face.I feel so claustrophobic.This is
way difficult for me and has become a big trial.

We found some potential houses in our area.We just need to get the mission president or one
of the secretaries to come look and approve one.They haven’t had time to do that with my
companion being sick.

I had an interview with our new mission president this week
that was great!He gave me
direction.He isn’t worried about
numbers at all.He just wants me to always
have the Spirit with me and to work hard.

I get feed well here!I ate chicken hearts the other day.They were terrible.They just
tasted like blood to me. I have had churrasco six times!Churrasco is
barbeque Brazilian style. They use
salt to season the meat.They use all
kinds of parts from cows and chickens.They also use sausages.

Monday, October 6, 2014

This week has been both great and terrible. Conference was great! It was really nice to hear Portuguese live from one of the speakers. It was more difficult to understand the translated messages. Please post Elder Bednar’s message to my Facebook page. I really liked it.

It has been a terrible week for our investigators. Satan is working overtime. We have zero people in our teaching pool.

My companion and I are searching for an apartment. I’ve already talked to the zone leaders, but one the reasons we want to get a new house so badly is because we don’t want to live in the rat infested place we have now. I haven’t sent pictures of our current house because it is so trashed. I’ve been trying to clean and reduce the problem, but we literally have rats and bugs throughout.

I have an interview with the mission president this week. I look forward to that!